


(Death is)No escape for the wicked

by LauraS26



Category: Addams Family - All Media Types, Heathers (1988), Heathers: The Musical - Murphy & O'Keefe
Genre: Dancing, Man Eating Plant, Man eating vulture, Necromancy, Romance, Sentient gate, Temporary Character Death, sentient house
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-13
Updated: 2019-11-11
Packaged: 2020-01-12 12:00:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18446129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LauraS26/pseuds/LauraS26
Summary: Killing for her, dying for her,andkilling her? That's practically his bleeding heart in a box as far as romantic gestures go for an Addams, so there's no way Veronica is leaving him behind when she claws her way out of her grave. This boy is hers, and she knows he’s gonna just love life on the Addams side.





	1. Dead girl walking

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Her Mother Was The White Sheep; You Wouldn't Believe the Rest of Her Family](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18434759) by [DilynAliceBlake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DilynAliceBlake/pseuds/DilynAliceBlake). 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Edited little bits of grammar, spelling, and a couple of phrases for improved flow. Please feel free to point out any errors you spot. :)

Slender, elegant, deathly pale fingers paused in their task of artfully arranging a display of wickedly spiked headless rose stems. The equally slender, elegant and deathly pale owner of the fingers smiled delightedly, turning her head to look at her husband sitting across the room with a newspaper.

"Oh Gomez, it's wonderful news darling! Cousin Veronica just died. A double suicide. Or perhaps a murder suicide, it’s not entirely clear. Either way, it’s so romantic, and her first death too." 

Her husband bounded to his feet and swept across the room. Gathering her in his arms he dipped her back deeply, not passing up the opportunity to place a few ardent kisses to her throat and collarbones.

"Excellent! And so young too! A certified prodigy that one! I'll start arranging the ball and you and Grandmama can go and see if she needs any help. The first resurrection can be tricky after all! Why, after I died the first time, I lost half the nerves in my back. Being tortured just hasn't been the same since cara mia!" His joyous voice dipped into a mournful register at the end.

Oh she knew. It only meant she got to play twice as hard to earn that rewarding bloom of anguish on his handsome face. He scooped her back upright, strong hands holding her steady as she regained her equilibrium. Yes, she certainly chose well with this one. Satisfaction burned hot in her chest as it often did when he affirmed the merit of her choice.

"Of course Querido. It's a lovely night to raise the dead." She smiled the mysterious smile she knew always drew his eyes to her mouth, even after all these years of marriage.

"Oh Tish, that's Spanish!" He couldn't resist hauling her close for desperate, punishing bites and kisses. She allowed it. A few more hours dead never hurt anyone.

Xxxxx

Veronica admired the back of her hands, the line of thick black stitches holding the left one onto her wrist bringing a pleased smile to her face. How beautiful, and what a wonderful story to tell the children one day. She cast her abyssal gaze on the slowly warming corpse beside her. It often took a bit longer to raise a non Addams, they just weren't as in harmony with death so it took a while for them to shake it off. But soon he would wake, and she would take him away. Nobody would be looking for them, they were both dead after all.

She looked around the graveyard serenely. How lovely to have been buried with her love in the very graveyard he put to death those foul little boys in her honour. Of course their graves hadn't been together. A high school romance didn't warrant paired graves unfortunately. But after she dug herself out of her own, she had crawled over and lay beside his to recover in the moonlight while Auntie Tisha dug him up. Well, what was left of him. He had been holding the bomb when it went off, so his body had been quite a bit more damaged than hers. The necromantic magic had patched him up better than new in her opinion. She had asked Auntie Tisha to use one of her own lungs for the flesh component in the ritual that rebuilt a damaged cadaver and made it fit for habitation. She would always be a part of him now. It wasn't quite as intimate as a heart, but she wouldn't do that without consent. She trembled slightly at the flush of heat that thought caused meeting the chill of death that still lingered in her flesh. Delightful. It was a bit of a shame than her Auntie and Grandmama had already acquired a sacrifice for the ritual, but the unused corpse would make a lovely treat for Cleopatra and Zelda. 

Movement in the corner of her eye caught her attention. His pinky finger twitching. And there again. She smiled proudly. That was faster than most non Addamses, it wasn't as strong, but clearly he shared in the family affinity. Well, his response to even the thought of losing her was mass murder. Very sweet really, he would make a wonderful Addams. Her flesh inside him would help, leaching it's _not quite right_ nature into the surrounding tissue. Too sharp teeth gleamed in a triumphant smirk.

Morticia looked upon her niece knowingly from where she and Grandmama sat a few graves away enjoying a perfectly poisonous picnic. There really was nothing better than a nice necromancy picnic to bond the women in the family. Of course men could do it, but honestly to pull it off right needed a woman’s touch. Men rarely had the delicacy to do more than barge back and forth across the veil like beasts, leaving nerves, organs, memories all over the place. Of course that sometimes had its own appeal... The only thing that could make this night better was some miserable drizzle. She could clearly see the Addams madness in young Veronica and it brought a smile to blood red lips. She was never letting that boy go. Killing for her, dying for her, _and_ killing her? That was practically wedding vows for an Addams, and that look in young Veronica's eyes said there would be no take backs.

The boy was twitching, she noted in approval. That was fast, a good sign. An affinity for death, and a good dash of madness were excellent traits for an Addams spouse. Shouldn't be much longer before he woke up. His chest was already rising and falling too. Wonderful. 

She took a sip of her drink, humming in pleasure.

"Oh Grandmama you've outdone yourself, this drink is positively repulsive. The eye of newt really covers up the sweetness of the belladonna” she murmured appreciatively.

"Thank you dearie, there's just a dash more cyanide too, for that little afterburn!"

The two shared a quiet smile looking over at the young no longer quite dead couple.

"Young love. To be laid to rest, rotting and leaching into the same cold dirt as your beloved for all eternity. It makes me long for my Gomez."

The hag smiled again at the younger woman.

"Glorious, aren't they? Not even a year and already she's got her flesh anchored inside him! He'll be an Addams before he knows it! That girlie will eat his heart before she lets him take it from her, you mark my words!" She ended with a cackle and sat back to watch the show. It was always fun watching a non Addams unexpectedly return to life for the first time!


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this is so short. My mum passed away unexpectedly last week, this is what I wrote beforehand. It's not edited, looked over, or even to the point I would cut a chapter but I'm not sure how long it'll be until I write again so I'm just dropping it here for you. I hope you like it and feel free to comment any typos or grammar screw ups xx

She glowed under the moonlight. Not just figuratively because he adored her, though that too. No, her pale skin was literally giving off an eerie, sickly glow it hadn't had before. He would know, with the probably-should-be-embarrassing amount of time he had spent just looking at her. Her hair looked darker too, and her beautiful deep brown eyes sort of made him feel like the abyss was looking back at him.

"...Veronica?" His voice came out misty and bewildered, but surprisingly smooth considering he was pretty sure he'd blown up his voice box, along with the rest of him.

His clever girl picked up on what he was thinking just like she had always been able to and gave a wry smile and unconcerned shrug. Her dress slipped with the movement revealing a line of perfectly even, thick, black stitches around her throat.

"Being dead always enhances our Other traits. They'll fade after I've been alive a while. Mostly. The more I die, the less they'll fade though, so if they bother you, we'll just have to be more careful with our rough play..." A slight flush dusted her pretty, pallid cheeks and was he losing it or did she sound reluctant about that?

Rough play? He was pretty sure he had murdered them both, though he _had_ tried to get her to back off from him and the bomb, and she considered it rough play? It made her blush? And actually, speaking of the bomb, how were they even alive? In the middle of all these thoughts his hand reached up of its own accord to cup her cheek. With her leaning over the edge of the hole he was in, he felt like a mortal stretching up to touch a dark goddess.

"You're here. With me. I don't understand any of this, but as long as you're with me I can get through anything. Even death apparently."

"Oh you are going to make a perfect Addams." She breathed. He felt like prey under her possessive gaze. Just like he had the night she crawled through his bedroom window and had her wicked way with him. He liked it. Liked feeling that he was hers, that she wanted him as much as he needed her to breathe. Actually, speaking of breathing, something felt off in his body. More than the weird chill that permeated every inch of his flesh. Ugh, who knew what side effects there were from somehow pulling a Lazarus.

"Addams? I'll be anything you want me to be Veronica, but I'm...Uh I'm really confused here. Were we actually dead? Like, shuffled off our mortal coil, expired, blown to kingdom come dead?"

"Oh yes,” she purred, “your bomb killed us both, my first death. I couldn't have asked for much better, though I'd have preferred an extra second to reach you. To die wrapped in your arms would really have been perfect." Her predatory expression turned dreamy, her voice breathy as it misted unnaturally in the cold air between them.

"Jason Dean, my J.D., will you do as you promised me that night? Will you honour your word and love this dead girl walking?"

"Yes!" He yelped, lurching up onto his knees in what he now registered was his pried open coffin, in his dug up grave, to grab her face in his hands. He locked eyes with her intensely, willing her to see his absolute fervent sincerity.

"Veronica Sawyer-"

"Addams."

"What?"

"My name is Veronica Addams." He blinked in surprise, but shrugged, accepting this new knowledge about his love. A name was just a name. It didn’t change anything.

"Alright. Sure. Veronica Addams. I utterly adore you. I would kill anyone who looked at you wrong. I would die with a smile on my face, again, if you only hinted it would make you happy. I would live an eternity as your pet and never wish for freedom. You being some sort of zombie, and me apparently somehow being the same isn't going to change that. I worship you."


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all, sorry for the long delay. I mentioned in the last chapter that my Mum had passed away. Between then and now my Nanna who I was very close with has passed too. It’s been a pretty rubbish few months and I’m not sure how up to par this is. It’s just sort of fillery but I hope you enjoy it. 
> 
> Again no guarantees on when the next chapter will be out. Feel free to point out any mistakes you spot and thank you to the lovely commenters. Thanks for reading xx

She smiled fiercely at him, her abyssal eyes glinting unnaturally in the dark. 

“Oh I’m so glad you said that liebling, I’d be so disappointed to have to bury you again,”-He sort of got the feeling he wouldn’t have received the luxury of dying first if she _had_ decided to bury him again-“The family are just going to love you. Come and meet Grandmama and Auntie Tisha. They helped me raise you. I’m still young, so after I rose I didn’t have quite enough energy or focus to put you back together by myself. I did pull you back through the veil though!”

She looked abashed, for some reason ashamed that she hadn’t been able to raise him from the dead alone, and defensive when she had declared she’d pulled him back through the veil. He guessed that meant she pulled his soul or something back from death and shoved it in the body her relatives had patched up. J.D.’s mind was still scrambling to catch up, between the state of his recently dead brain, and the situation of being recently dead he thought this could be forgiven. Abruptly, two things registered.

“You speak German?” His voice came out reverent, though he was pretty sure he had intended to sound indignant.

“And uh, you painted my nails while I was dead?” That one came out exactly as bewildered as intended.

She smiled that enigmatic smile of hers and he knew the answers didn’t matter. She answered anyway.

“Ja, I learned from uncle Mordred, he speaks over thirty languages. Though he is ancient and extraordinarily well travelled. And your nails aren’t painted.” She took one hand in hers and raised it to her lips, placing reverent kisses to each obsidian fingernail.

“It’s your Otherness showing. You’ve crossed the veil both ways. That changes even a non Addams. I think they’re lovely, but like my own differences, they’ll fade with time, and stick the more we dance through the veil together.” Her eyes turned sharp, pinning him like a mounted butterfly.

“And it will be together. All of your deaths belong to me now, just as I pledge all of mine to you.”

The words hung between them like a vow in the night air.

He distantly registered a surprised inhalation and quiet murmurs somewhere off to the side, but he was so overwhelmed with joy at the morbidly intimate declaration. He was entirely happy for his death to belong to her, but she had willingly, without prompting bestowed hers on him in return. 

“Of course, they’re all yours precious.” He twisted her hand holding his own, and planted ardent kisses up her scarred wrist and pale inner forearm.

She blushed in a way he could only feel was adorable and snapped her teeth playfully at him. 

“Let’s go, they’re waiting”. He nodded and followed her eyeline, spotting two indistinct shapes in the gloom. She moved more gracefully than he remembered her being before, from her seated position to a crouch, and extended her other hand. A clear offer to help him out of the grave he belatedly processed that he had just been sort of loitering in. Well it was his grave, so he supposed he could loiter all he liked. When he extended his free arm to her, she shifted her grip so she was holding both arms by the wrists. He braced one foot on the top edge of his coffin, and let her take his weight on his arms. He expected a messy scramble to get out of the six foot hole, but she was _far_ stronger than he imagined, hauling him up easily in one smooth move as she rose to her feet.

“Wow Veronica, have you been working out? That was crazy!” He gasped out, simultaneously scooping her up in his arms and spinning in circles. She laughed breathlessly and threw her arms around his head, pulling his face into her breasts since he was holding her high up. Sharp nailed fingers wound into his hair and scritched pleasantly at his scalp.

“It’s an Addams thing, now put me down and come and meet some more of us and have something to eat before I spirit you away.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Hallowe’en month! I want to try and get at least one more chapter out by the 31st, I have some snippets written, just have to paste them all together! As always, comments and concrit welcome. I’ll try to reply to all comments, though it won’t always be straight away. Thanks for reading!
> 
> Laura Xx

The Addams family mansion was _wild_. According to Veronica it wasn’t her usual home, though the permanent residents insisted it was home for any Addams who wanted it. Since her branch of the apparently extensive clan resided in Europe, they were staying here for her first rising party. Which was a thing for Addamses. Just. Casually dying, and not staying dead. It still blew his mind, morbid humour fully intended. J.D. smirked to himself. 

He’d known from the beginning that Veronica was different, but never in a million years could he have seen _this_ coming.

For starters, as a recently ex-person, he had no choice but to accept that magic was real. And if the resurrection hadn’t hammered that home, the fact that the mansion was alive would have. The big, twisted, gothic, iron gate had tilted towards the hearse Morticia drove(perfect for carrying the body that was apparently intended as a snack for some sort of pets!) as if squinting suspiciously down at it, then seemingly satisfied with what it saw(sensed? He couldn’t see any eyes!), it swung itself open with a long, ominous creak. Veronica’s eerily beautiful aunt leaned her head out the window and, as if she understood Gate-screech, laughed, and told it, “Yes dear one, you can expect to see the whole clan coming through soon! Keep up the excellent work, I’ll send Zelda down to see you when we get settled.”

Grandmama, riding in the back with the corpse suddenly thrust an arm between the seats. Not her own arm. Nope, the arm of the body, that she’d somehow removed very quietly back there.

“Here you go dearie, she’ll appreciate a nice snack when she gets here!” And with surprising strength and accuracy, she pitched the severed arm between the headrests, out the window, and it wedged in one of the gate’s decorative iron curls.

The gate screeched again, apparently in gratitude and the hag waved it off with a cackle.

And that was only the gate! As soon as Veronica led his unprotesting, dazed form out of the hearse, up the steps, and through the door opened by ‘Lurch’, (was Frankenstein’s monster the family butler???) he felt eyes on him. Judging eyes. From every direction. Noticing his tension Veronica gave him a sharp smile. It made his heart spasm in maybe lust, or possibly fear. So his wires were a bit crossed, but he liked it. He liked all her expressions. “That’s just the house trying to get a feel for you,”-she shoved his unresisting body up against the closest wall-“better to get it over with here than in your bed.” 

He felt his left eye develop a twitch as he swore he could hear the wall sniffing him. Huh, that had never happened before. He wondered if it would be a permanent tic, or stop when he got used to this...This.

He decided to go with it. “Hey...House, how's it going? Do I smell okay, I’m afraid I recently returned from the dead so you’ll have to forgive me if I smell a little...cadaverous.”

Grandmama cackled gleefully as she wandered off to who knows where.

Morticia turned to Veronica and smiled, pressing her hands together in front of her lips. “Oh my little banshee, you chose well. He’ll fit right in, the family are going to adore him.”

Huh, well he could only be glad his future in-laws were going to like him. And from the approving feeling in the air, he had apparently befriended his first sentient house.

Morticia turned her smile on him next, waving an elegant hand dismissively. “Don’t worry, the house loves the scent of fresh corpses. We try to always have one or two on hand. Not this one though, this is for my girls.” Well that was ominous, but who was he to judge? He had tried to blow up all his schoolmates, poisoned Heather Chandler, and killed those two creeps that had the temerity to think they were even close to being worthy of laying their filthy hands on his Veronica. He smiled back widely, revealing very slightly sharper than normal canines and her dark eyes glinted with approval.

“Come dears, Dinner will be in an hour, just enough time for you to meet Gomez and the children.” She took a casual step to the left, and moments later an arrow quivered, embedded in the wall where her head had been an instant before. 

A voice trickled down from the top of the stairs, the speaker obscured by the bannister. “Drat. Her situational awareness is too good. We need to increase the manoeuvrability so we can adjust for her reactions.”

“It was a very good try darlings, maybe next time. Now come down and greet cousin Veronica. She’s brought us a new family member!”

A rotund prepubescent boy tumbled loudly into view, having clattered down the stairs to land in a heap at the bottom. He was clutching a handful of worse-for-wear looking arrows matching the one in the wall. J.D. wondered if it was luck or experience that none of them had stabbed him as he fell. 

A few moments behind him a young girl followed. She looked every inch the miserable Victorian schoolgirl, in a black dress with a pointed white collar, and severe black braids falling on either side of her head. Or she would if it weren’t for the dark glee in her eyes. Only the eyes. The rest of her expression was entirely blank. Well, the eyes, and the modified crossbow she held propped on one shoulder. 

“Oh no,” She deadpanned “Pugsley seems to have tripped over my foot and fallen down the stairs,” She prodded his groaning form with said foot. “and survived. What a pity.”

He couldn’t help the snort he let out at that, and those dark eyes, so like Morticia’s zeroed in on him. She scanned him dully. “Taking amusement in my failure. A good sense of schadenfreude is an appropriate trait in an Addams, but I’d like to see you do better.” She arched a challenging eyebrow. Was a child really challenging him to a murder off? He widened his eyes helplessly at Veronica.

“Go ahead. It’s a favourite Addams pastime, plotting and executing inventive ways to kill each other. But don’t take it lightly, we aren’t easy to take down at all. And don’t forget, all your deaths belong to me.” She all but snarled the last part, cutting her eyes at the girl, who stared back placidly.

As if to illustrate her point about the resilience of an Addams, the boy, Pugsley, stopped groaning and lurched to his feet. Before even dusting himself off he lifted his fist full of arrows and checked them over. Finding a handful of fletching feathers bent or broken he glared fiercely at his sister.

“Wednesday!” he yelled, round little face going red with ire, “You know Zelda made me bring her meat for _three weeks_ before she let me pluck these! And she took ALL the livers!”

The girl just smirked at that odd statement. “Well you should have been more careful with them.”

Pugsley went to lunge at his sister, but Morticia’s sharp voice stopped the oncoming brawl dead. “Now children. Is this how we greet visitors?” Her face was serene, but both children visibly shuddered.

“Hello cousin Veronica.” They chorused, the boy sounding far more sincere than his monotone sister.

Veronica grinned. “Hey little monsters. Catch anyone good lately?”

Pugsley opened his mouth to respond, but Morticia cleared her throat pointedly.

“Ah, Weds, Pugs, this is my J.D.,” she gave them a significant look, “I’m keeping him. J.D. these are my little cousins, Wednesday and Pugsley Addams. Feel free to kill them if you can!”

Morticia nodded, satisfied. “Now my darling little vipers, where is your father?”

There was no need for the kids to answer, as a dashing gentleman in a sharpblack suit, with slicked back hair and a thin moustache flounced into the foyer. Flounced was really the only way to put it. He had what looked like a very thorny rose stem with no flower clamped between gleaming white teeth.

Morticia turned at the sound of his footsteps, and as the man prowled towards her, she raised her arms into a dancing position. J.D. didn’t know enough about ballroom dance to tell a waltz from a tango, but when the two collided in a whirl of her hair and the tails of his coat it was intense. Their hands met and they moved in unison to music only they could hear.

The man, who could only be her husband Gomez, unclasped one of his hands from hers to take the rose stem from his mouth. He ran the prickly stem down her cheek before casting it aside to repeat the move with the back of his fingers. His face contorted into a manic grin, and he tilted her back, her spine arching uncannily over his firm arm. “Oh Cara Bella, I’ve missed you! The hours sundered from your side felt like a lifetime! Never leave my side again, I exhort you!”

She snapped upright and J.D. was impressed that Gomez smoothly mirrored the move so she didn’t hit him where he had hunched over her. She ran a sharply taloned hand down his face, nails coasting dangerously close to his eye, but he never flinched. “Oh Mon Amour, you know I carry you with me always. I’ll never let you go.” she guided his left hand over her breast to where J.D. could only assume her heart beat. But with these Addams who knew really? Veronica sighed dreamily.

“Oh Tish! That’s French!” The man held his wife’s arm out straight and pressed kisses fervently up it. J.D. found it kind of awkward to watch, but none of the other Addams’ seemed to find it uncomfortable.

He turned to Veronica to see her eyeing him back speculatively. Curious, he arched an eyebrow.

“Auntie Tisha and Uncle Gomez are my role models for marriage. You know I’m never letting you go, don’t you J.D.?” She smiled coyly, but he could see a hint of uncertainty in her eyes.

How could she possibly not know she was it for him? He reached out and tugged her into his arms. God, her presence was so big he always forgot just how short she was. He loved it, feeling like he could just wrap her up in himself and hoard her away from the world. Surround her completely and make her a part of him. He was hers entirely, but maybe she needed to know that she was his too.

He pressed a gentle kiss to her brow, then leaned lower, coiling around her until his mouth was right by her ear and he could purr, “Oh ‘Ronica, I wouldn’t let you if you tried. I was going to kill myself along with that corrupt cesspit of high school denizens when I thought you were forever out of my reach. But now I know you can _never_ be out of reach there’s nowhere you can escape me. I’d hunt you to the ends of the earth if I had to. Kill a thousand Heathers, Kurts, Rams. I’d burn the world to flush you out and keep you chained to my side for eternity.”

He was a bit worried he’d let too much of his monster show, but she was gazing up at him with a dazed look in her eyes and a cute flush across pale cheekbones.

A sharp clap startled her back into the present and they both whipped round to look at a manically clapping Gomez and an almost tearful looking Morticia. 

“Oh Gomez I haven’t heard anything so romantic since the time you poisoned everyone at the dinner party where that man was flirting with me, and then took me home and chained me to the rack for days.” She sighed in blissful remembrance and he nuzzled into her neck. 

“I still have the chains, Querida. Perhaps we could enjoy a re-enactment?”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Working on NaNo so this isn’t edited, just trying to crank out those words! I might go back and edit after November, but feel free to point out any mistakes in the meantime!
> 
> I love talking to you all, so drop me a comment just to say hey if you want. Thanks for reading, hope you like it!
> 
> Laura Xx

Before the elder Adamses could vanish into whatever love dungeon they had hidden in the house, the Frankensteinian creature, Lurch, well lurched into the room and groaned unintelligibly. Morticia nodded decisively and stepped away from her husband, ignoring his suddenly hangdog expression.

“Now dear, look what poor hosts we’ve been. We haven’t even offered J.D. a drink and it’s already time for supper. Unforgivable, isn’t it? We’ll have to punish each other later.” Her heated look didn’t even attempt to hide how agreeable she found that idea. Neither did her husband’s.

J.D. cut a playful smirk at Veronica. “I wonder if they serve drain cleaner?” 

She slapped him on the chest, nose in the air, and adopted an overblown snooty air.

”How rude! Of course we have drain cleaner, what sort of a family do you take us for? And not that cheap swill Heather Chandler kept on hand either. There’s just no accounting for taste,” she sighed pityingly, “you could barely even taste the lye!” 

Dropping the mocking persona, she eyed him thoughtfully, making him want to simultaneously roll over and expose his soft belly to her, and pin her to the floor and force her to bare hers. Caught between the clashing instincts, he did nothing at all.

“Hmm, you’d probably survive it you know, all the chemicals in those deliciously noxious slurpees should have built up your resistance to toxins, and our quick trip through the veil will only have helped.”

Out of the corner of his eye he noticed Wednesday giving him a considering look, and when Veronica followed his line of sight and spotted it too, her lip curled up to bare glistening teeth, and a distinctly non-human snarl tore from her throat. 

“Mine.”

The younger girl looked vaguely sulky, but not at all as scared as he thought his terrifying death-goddess’ dark look warranted. 

“Well you could share. I haven’t had a toy that could take more than a mild mauling without breaking in months.” She paused. “Except Pugsley, but he doesn’t scream like I want.”

“Wednesday, my sweet, monstrous little piranha. If you lay a hand on My J.D. without my express permission, I’ll bury you alive in an unmarked grave, and I won’t tell anyone where you are until I’ve replaced every item of clothing you own with pink, white, and yellow.“ Veronica hissed the last colour with a venom he wasn’t sure it deserved, but he sure as hell wasn't going to tell her that while she was clearly on a warpath. 

“There will be flowers. Don’t test me baby cousin.”

While the threat of burying alive hadn’t had the slightest effect on the young Addams, the promise of bright clothing had her eyes going round and horrified. J.D hadn’t thought her face had held any colour to lose in the first place, but apparently he had been wrong. She’d gone from bone white, to paper.

“Now now Veronica, I’m sure my little vampire bat will keep her talons off of your mate without invitation.” Boomed Gomez jovially. “You’ve gotten good at those threats, I see the Russian school is truly as diabolical as promised!” Gomez snagged his niece’s attention from his trembling daughter with a wink, giving the girl a chance to recover her equilibrium. 

With one last dark frown, and a possessive hand wrapped around J.D.’s wrist like a gladly welcomed shackle, she allowed the distraction and the party started heading out of the room, presumably for the dining room.

“Yes uncle Gomez, I’m positive I got top marks for my placement at Westerberg. Maybe even extra credit, and you know Dame Błędnica is a real demon about that.”

“Literally!” He laughed, and they exchanged amused looks. Clearly an in joke that he didn’t get. Her teacher couldn’t really be a demon, right?

Then he registered her first statement, pulling his attention from gazing adoringly at her face and pondering the possibility of demons.

“Placement?”

She nodded, turning back to him. “Mhm, my final assessment for my combined infiltration, deception, and forgery course. It’s AP level. I had to pass myself off as a normal girl, in a normal school, and to have at least twelve forged documents accepted without question by at least five different targets.” 

She stroked his jaw and grinned sharply. “I never expected to meet you at all. To have gotten tangled up in your delightful murder schemes without falling under suspicion, and have my forgeries accepted by the American authorities is sure to get me that extra credit.”

She looked more thrilled by the prospect than he thought school grades should really make anyone feel. Her next words made her enthusiasm make sense though. Sort of. In what he was swiftly coming to learn was a very Addamsish way.

“The last person Dame Błędnica awarded extra credit to was a prolific cannibal who married into a royal family, ate several nobles, and was never even suspected until he ate his wife in a ritual to assist in the crusade of the dark forces. What a legacy to follow!” He was pretty sure he saw actual stars in her abyssal eyes.

“Oh! Great grand uncle Vilificus!” Piped up the chubby boy, pumping his fist full of arrows in the air.

Veronica ignored him utterly.

“Plus I got you. Worth every moment surrounded by all those regular teenagers.” She shuddered delicately.

It explained a few questions that had been starting to bubble to the surface of his mind as it slowly regained its faculties after its temporary brush with being a sooty smear on the floor. Questions like what an Addams had even been doing in Westerberg high school at all, or why she had seemed so distraught over the murders he had involved her in at the time, but totally accepting of, and even amused by them now.

Well it answered those questions, but now he wanted to know what sort of school ‘the Russian school’ was, that taught infiltration, deception, and forgery as an AP course, and boasted high ranking cannibal alumni with pride. And possibly even had literal demons for teachers?

Putting that aside-he had forever to learn every single thing that went into making up Veronica Addams now- he nuzzled into the hand still on his cheek. Struck by the need to turn his face and nip sharply at her wrist, he did just that, deliberately shutting down the little voice in his head blaring that ‘Only animals bite, you little bastard!’. Huh, sounded just like dear old dad.

Her breath hitched, and he soothed the little sting with a flick of his tongue and a quick kiss before pulling away and stepping into the dining room with a devilish smirk.

 

Veronica guided him into the seat to the right of the head of the table, digging her talons into his arm through his shirt in vengeance, and claimed the one beside him. Morticia took the head and Gomez the place at the foot, with Pugsley facing J.D. on his mother’s other side, Wednesday facing Veronica, and Grandmama appearing out of nowhere to sit beside Wednesday. It left an empty seat between Gomez and Veronica, facing Grandmama.

J.D. couldn’t help but stare when a severed hand jumped into the vacant space, using its fingers like tiny legs, with its stumpy wrist bobbing in the air like the abdominal flap of a peacock spider. What? Yeah, he was just going to roll with it. 

Maybe the bomb had just put him in a coma and this was all a very vivid hallucination. If it was he didn’t ever want to wake up.

“Ah, Thing old chap! Where have you been all day?” Seemingly in response to the Addams patriarch the fingers started tapping out a pattern on the table surface. Busy watching the interaction J.D. jumped in his seat when a bowl thumped down in front of him, contents slopping precariously but not spilling over the side, and Lurch growl-groaned from right behind him.

“Oh, uh, thanks Lurch.” He offered lamely, hoping the growl wasn’t a question requiring a response. 

Clearly he wasn’t that lucky. The hulking servant rolled his eyes dramatically.

“What...do you...want...to drink.” Lurch’s voice was slow, ponderous, and had no inflection, so the query didn’t register as a question for a moment.

One of the butler’s frankly enormous feet tapped impatiently. J.D. couldn’t help but think he wasn’t very subordinate for a servant. 

“Uhh, have you got coffee?” He grasped for an answer. His first thought, the drain cleaner, wasn’t something he wanted to try for the first time at the dinner table.

Lurch nodded.

“How...much...belladonna.” Again it didn’t sound like a question, but J.D. was ready for it this time. Well, he was ready for the tone anyway.

“What? I don’t-“ He was cut off by the matriarch clearing her throat delicately.

“We have aconite if you prefer dear. I know a lot of you young ones have been trying that new diet that’s going around. What is it called?” One long, sharp nailed finger tapped her cheek in thought.

Lurch groaned.

“Ah yes thank you Lurch, the ‘no nightshade for ninety days’ plan. Lurch is on it to maintain his svelte figure. It really is effective, but I simply couldn’t do without my nightshade for so long.”

“Oh Cara, you don’t need to. Your body is simply...devilish. Like something straight from the depths of the pit.” Growled her husband from the other end of the table, prompting an exchange of molten looks.

J.D. shrugged. When in Rome.

“I’ll try one belladonna I guess, no milk thanks, I take it as black as my soul.”

The children, Grandmama, and Gomez broke into an assortment of chuckles, giggles, and cackles, and Morticia pressed her fingertips delicately to her lips to hide a smile.

“He’ll have two drops thanks Lurch.” Veronica came to his rescue. He felt himself flush but nodded his agreement.

The manservant nodded jerkily and stomped off without responding.

J.D. finally looked down at the...food...in front of him. An interestingly eye smarting mix of dark, grimy purple, and a colour he had never seen before looked back. With an eye. And when he said he hadn’t seen the colour before, he meant that literally. A vague thought about shrimp and visible colour ranges flitted through his mind. Did dying give you shrimp eyesight? Did necromancy? Was he really going to eat this?

“Don’t forget to play with your food dearie!” crowed Grandmama, stabbing sharply at one of the eyes in her bowl and breaking into nails-on-glass cackles when it lurched through the goop to avoid her thrust. 

His mind rebelled, but weirdly enough, his body didn’t. There was no sick squirming in his stomach, his gorge didn’t rise, cool sweat didn’t break out along his spine. Fuck it, he would give it a go. 

He picked up his cutlery and eyeballed the dish, picking out a target. That big blue eye. Maybe bigger would be slower. Yes, he was really trying to outthink a bowlful of eyeballs in gloop, guess this was his life now. He lunged.


End file.
